Home services industry is a multi-billion dollar opportunity for India–Arun Kapoor, Founder–Ok Si

MUMBAI, India - March 1, 2016 - PRLog -- The multi-billion dollar organised home services industry in India is still in its nascent stage with multiple service providers from having single dedicated service segment (plumbing/electrician) to others providing host of services (key making, electrician requirements, nurse services etc. to booking Helicopter rides) on a click. Most of these service providers are steadily trying to improve product offerings to create a ‘one app for all services’ to gain traffic to their site, increase their market presence and hoping to create a national footprint.

Home Services industry, historically in India, has been an unorganised market and any or all services were either sourced from the open marketplace or from the experience of family and friends. The industry also thrived on unskilled labours primarily due to the low cost of delivery and on the abundance of manpower. The industry was also largely driven by large brands, mostly for electronic goods, providing annual maintenance contract as brand extensions for nominal costs.

The ripples of the new age organized and skilled workers is slowly gaining access to the common man’s home primarily due to the ease of service search (app based), cost benefits and skilled technicians compared to the open marketplace.

In the wake of a growing consumer base, service bouquet and the void of any organised platform, investments in this space has also gathered a huge positive response from investors across the globe and many home service providers have already been invested in or are in the verge of being invested. The home service industry is getting organised and the service providers & investors are realising the unlocked potential of this sector. Though most of the home service providers are looking at extending their services across major cities in India, few of them are also considering the potential of Tier I & II locations. Many industry sources claim that the current Home service industry size between $100-400 billion.

With only 12% internet penetration in the country, India is an unlocked opportunity and the market acquisition probability in the home services space in limitless. On the other hand, India’s fast growing mobile telephony services with over 980 million users and with the number of smart-phone users estimated to sharply rise to around 650 million in 2019 from 140 million in 2014, the home service industry is bound to gain tremendously from its growth.

The industry is evolving on the basis of consumer requirements and having presence through apps is now more meaningful only when the consumer can avail services as & when desired. The whole purpose of being easily accessible on mobile through apps is for the consumer to experience seamless service satisfaction, a challenge that has led to create a 360 degree consumer experiential programme from downloading app, logging in, service selections, and payment gateways in the front end to skill & etiquette training for technicians, tele-calling to consumer redressal centres in the back-end.

The Home services industry has also been an opportunity provider in creating employment & entrepreneur possibilities for the unorganised market. Many semi-skilled labours/technicians are now a part of this growing eco-system that provides them an opportunity of skill enhancement, regular employability and the option to also work as free-lancers in their own capacity.

The opportunity for multi-sector growth is also a valid positioning in the coming days and the most associations are bound to happen with sectors like Real Estate, Hospitality, Retail and the HealthCare.